Democracy Matters: Rights and Responsibilities

Democracies rest upon the principle that government exists to serve the people.  In other words, the people are citizens of the democratic state, not its subjects.  Because the state protects the rights of its citizens, they, in turn, give the state their loyalty. Under an authoritarian system, by contrast, the state demands loyalty and service from its people without any reciprocal obligation to secure their consent for its actions.

Fundamental Rights

This relationship of citizen and state is fundamental to democracy. In the words of the U.S. Declaration of Independence, written by Thomas Jefferson in 1776:

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.  That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

More specifically, in democracies, these fundamental or inalienable rights include freedom of speech and expression, freedom of religion and conscience, freedom of assembly, and the right to equal protection before the law.  This is by no means an exhaustive list of the rights that citizens enjoy in a democracy, but it does constitute a set of the irreducible core rights that any democratic government worthy of the name must uphold.  Since they exist independently of government, in Jefferson's view, these rights cannot be legislated away, nor should they be subject to the whim of an electoral majority.

Speech, Assembly, and Protest

Freedom of speech and expression, especially about political and social issues, is the lifeblood of any democracy.  Democratic governments do not control the content of most written and verbal speech.  Thus democracies are usually filled with many voices expressing different or even contrary ideas and opinions.  Democracies tend to be noisy.

Democracy depends upon a literate, knowledgeable citizenry whose access to information enables it to participate as fully as possible in the public life of society and to criticize unwise or oppressive government officials or policies.  Citizens and their elected representatives recognize that democracy depends upon the widest possible access to uncensored ideas, data, and opinions.  For a free people to govern themselves, they must be free to express themselves — openly, publicly, and repeatedly — in speech and in writing.

The protection of free speech is a so-called "negative right," simply requiring that the government refrain from limiting speech.  For the most part, the authorities in a democracy are uninvolved in the content of written and verbal speech.

Protests serve as a testing ground for any democracy — thus the right to peaceful assembly is essential and plays an integral part in facilitating the use of free speech.  A civil society allows for spirited debate among those in disagreement over the issues.  In the modern United States, even fundamental issues of national security, war, and peace are discussed freely in newspapers and in broadcast media, with those opposed to the administration's foreign policy easily publicizing their views.

Freedom of speech is a fundamental right, but it is not absolute, and cannot be used to incite to violence.  Slander and libel, if proven, are usually defined and controlled through the courts.  Democracies generally require a high degree of threat to justify banning speech or gatherings that may incite violence, untruthfully harm the reputation of others, or overthrow a constitutional government.  Many democracies ban speech that promotes racism or ethnic hatred.

The challenge for all democracies, however, is one of balance: to defend freedom of speech and assembly while countering speech that truly encourages violence, intimidation, or subversion of democratic institutions.  One can disagree forcefully and publicly with the actions of a public official; calling for his (or her) assassination, however, is a crime.